Touch the Deepest Part of Me
by Lornesgoldenhair
Summary: Just as Clara thought the Doctor was relaxing, hugging, even being romantic, he vanishes deep inside the TARDIS. When she finds him it seems all is not well. She thinks she can help but ends up discovering an inner world of his desperate love for her, his overwhelming self doubt, and the loneliness of a thousand years. Whouffaldi. M. Post Last Christmas.
1. Chapter 1

'Right, come on, where are you?' Clara stopped mid corridor and placed her hands on her hips. Back in her flat the Doctor would appear frequently, unheralded and often when least appropriate, Hoovering in her underwear had become an impossibility. Now that she lived on the TARDIS he had become downright elusive, vanishing down corridors that moved and disappearing into rooms whose doors went missing as often as he did. She was beginning to wonder if he was avoiding her deliberately.

Or maybe he had always been this way? A loner in space. She could never be sure how much time elapsed between visits to her. Perhaps instead of days or hours it was more like weeks and months and he was in fact perfectly contented to roam about his spaceship by himself. Why change because she was here?

But she knew that wasn't true, that despite himself he sought company more often than not, and usually it was hers. He had been so delighted that she had accepted his invitation to join him. For the first few weeks they were inseparable, their trips imbued with new enthusiasm. He saw the world through fresh eyes, his smile came easier, broader, he held her hand and she had to admit the sight of him relaxed and at ease made her heart warm. She'd nearly keeled over from shock when he'd put his arm round her one evening in the library and pulled her close as he read. He seemed… happy, and that made her happy and surely the novelty value hadn't worn off already.

But there she was, standing in the middle of the corridor, no Doctor in sight. Again. How many days had it been this time since she'd seen him, two, three? And when she had, coming across him in one of the TARDIS sitting rooms purely by accident he had jumped out of his skin as her hand touched his arm. He'd dismissed it as nothing but it was something alright. Clara suspected it was the same something that caused him to more or less flee from a pleasant crowd of alien market traders the week before when she had finally persuaded him after a fortnight of hiding in little rooms that a low impact trip might cheer him up. He reluctantly agreed and off they went to one of his and her favourite open air markets, stall upon stall of oddities that would usually have his eyes lit up in curiosity but he remained downcast and strangely closed off.

Until the traders as was their want started pestering him to look at their goods, hands and some tentacles reaching for him and voices high with excitement and promise. He had turned heel and headed straight for the TARDIS without a word other than she could shop on her own, he'd wait for her at home. Clara had been left to apologise for his grumpiness and frustrated with him decided that yes she would go shopping by herself thank you very much.

She didn't buy anything.

She didn't know whether to be angry or worried.

And then there were the layers. He'd always worn layers, well he had since Christmas. T-shirt, jumper, hoodie, jacket, but there just seemed to be more and more of them. Suddenly he had a scarf, long and navy, wound twice around his neck and him burying his chin in it, peering with storm grey eyes over the edge. And gloves. Why he wanted to wear gloves in the perfectly warm environment of the TARDIS she had no idea but there they were, dark leather gloves hidden deep in his pockets where he shoved his hands, or in the folds of his crossed arms as he hugged himself tight and drew away from her.

Well enough was enough.

She wanted an explanation for his strange behaviour and she wanted one now. Clara looked up vaguely at the ceiling.

'Show me where he is,' she said, and the ship pulsed in reply, a trail of dimly lit footprints springing up on the floor beneath her. Apparently the TARDIS was worried too, she wasn't usually so compliant.

'Thank you,' Clara said and followed the prints.

He was deep in the bowels of the ship it seemed and she was beginning to wonder if the TARDIS was siding with her master after all and leading Clara a merry dance when the footprints finally came to a halt outside of a large circular door in dusky pink. At the centre of the door a circular window peeked in on the room inside, a room lit softly with a similar coloured light and from which no sound could be heard. Clara stood on tiptoes and looked through the glass, straining to catch a glimpse of the Doctor.

He was in the centre of the bare room, its walls curving up around him until they met in a dome above. They were panelled with large dusty pink spheres set on a cream background and lit by something internal to them. The floor was cream and smooth and looked soft, plush almost and there was no furniture.

But he was sitting on something. It just happened to be air. Clara's eyebrows raised as she watched him slightly adjust his position where he sat cross legged about three feet from the floor, hovering or more accurately levitating in the lotus position, still fully swamped in his multiple layers, his only concession to his position being that he had removed his boots and placed them neatly to one side of him.

The Zero Room, he'd retreated to the Zero room, a place of healing and tranquillity particularly for the uneasy mind or a Time Lord post regeneration. But he hadn't just regenerated, he wasn't injured. Something was wrong she could be sure of it now, he never came here unless troubled.

He looked peaceful in this cradle and something in her told her not to disturb him now, that it would be a very bad idea mid meditation to barge in and force him from his thoughts, she could wait until he was done. Clara took a step back quietly but as though reading her mind and in total disagreement the TARDIS chose that moment to fling open the door with an unceremonious thump causing Clara to squeak from shock and the Doctor's eyes to snap open suddenly. The second they did he crashed down sideways onto the mercifully soft floor beneath him and cursed loudly, words unforgivingly leaving his lips as he pushed himself upright and growled at his ship.

'Sorry!' Clara said, surprised by the uncharacteristic torrent of language, 'I was just going to leave… she…'

'Yes, yes… I know… it was her… you wouldn't have been able to open the door…'

Clara hesitantly stepped into the room, struck immediately by the pleasantly cool air and fragrance of jasmine. 'Why not?'

'Because I asked her to keep you out,' he said curtly. He was sitting upright, legs stretched out before him now, rubbing unseen fluff from his trousers before he slid his arms around his knees. He hugged them to himself and rocked slightly without looking at her.

The words stung. 'Oh,' she said. 'Any particular reason why?'

'So I wouldn't get disturbed and end up crashing to the ground.'

That seemed fair enough but she still felt a little hurt. She took a few steps forward and he glanced up at her quickly.

'Did you want something, everything alright?' he asked.

'I was going to ask you that.'

'I'm fine,' he said automatically.

Clara plopped down next to him, the cushioned floor giving under her body pleasantly. Across the room the TARDIS slammed the door shut again and the Doctor rolled his eyes.

'TARDIS wants us to talk,' Clara observed. A sound came from the door indicating it had been locked.

'Brilliant,' the Doctor grumbled. 'Well what would you like to talk about, it would seem we have all day thanks to Madam. The deforestation of Gyrus VI perhaps or the impending solar implosion of the dual suns of Hasterlen?'

'Why you keep hiding from me?'

'Anything but that,' he retorted.

'We're talking about it.'

'I'm not hiding from you.'

'Then what are you doing?'

The Doctor looked down at his gloved hands, dangling linked now between his knees, he chewed his lip and didn't reply. Clara huffed beside him.

'You're impossible when you're like this,' she said.

'Like what?'

'Uncommunicative.'

'I can't be sunshine and flowers all the time.'

'You're never sunshine and flowers,' Clara said sharply, 'But for a while there I was under the impression you were starting to enjoy life again.'

He caught her tone and looked suitably crestfallen.

'I was,' he said quietly. 'I am… sort of…'

'Then what_ is_ this?' her exasperation got the better of her and her pitch increased. Clara grabbed his forearm in remonstration but almost the moment she wrapped her fingers around it he jerked it away, flailing and half scooting across the floor by a foot or two. Clara's eyes widened.

'Over reaction?' she queried, 'I thought you did touching now. The odd hug? The hand holding…Oh…' her face fell as she thought back over the excitement of the first few weeks after their reunion. Maybe he had never meant it to get that far, that new softer side of him. Maybe he regretted it. She felt suddenly hurt embarrassed and very alone all at once. 'I see,' she said in a flat tone, 'You 'aren't a hugging person' again. You probably never really wanted to in the first place.'

He was looking at her from under his brows, still hunched anxiously where he had ended up some distance from her nearer the wall. She caught his eye and he looked away, nestling his chin back down into the wrappings of his scarf. No she had this wrong, this wasn't the Doctor who stiffly avoided hugs, the Doctor in front of her looked like he needed one but was too frightened to ask. Clara crawled forward on her knees to reach him and watched him eye her warily as though she might try the same move again.

'Why the flailing?' she asked. His nose sank into the scarf. Cautiously she reached forward and tugged it down a little, the tips of her fingers just brushing the skin above his top lip. He flinched and she frowned. 'Doctor?'

He looked down, fiddled with his gloves and then impulsively wrapped his arms round himself and held on tight. She could hear his breathing speeding up, rapid nervous breathing accompanied by the flitting of his eyes around the room and a swallow that smacked of someone trying to control panic.

But the Doctor didn't panic. Did he?

Her eyes roamed over his face for clues.

'You're sweating,' she said. 'It's not hot in here. But maybe _you_ are under all these layers,' she gently tugged the trailing end of the scarf. This time he didn't flinch. He managed a brief and hesitant smile heavy with sadness before the lower half of his face vanished again under the scarf. 'Doctor please talk to me,' she tried again.

Sometimes he had the widest eyes, wider even she suspected than her own could be at times. Sometimes he just looked so haunted and so strangely young when he looked at her, vulnerable and open. There was always a little of the child about his serious facade and every now and then that child, usually so playful and full of curiosity, was downright frightened. This was one of those times. He turned his eyes on her and her heart ached for him.

Clara reached out and tugged the scarf back down purposefully, determined to defeat the barrier between them. She dug about in the layers of his clothing for one gloved hand watching him watch her progress the whole time. He was holding his breath, something which as a Time Lord he could do for an unnerving length of time. While he was so utterly still she inched her fingertips under the scarf, into the crook of his arm where his opposite hand rested. Inched further to unpick his fingers from his rib cage and form some sort of grip on them. Tugged to try to bring that hand out to be held. He was still holding his breath and she could feel a tremble running through him. His eyes darting to hers and down to her hand, his lips parting slightly as though he wanted to protest. Clara finally held his hand and rested it on her knee, covering it with her other palm. She smiled up at him and was about to try and coax him into speaking when…

When his breathing suddenly returned to him rapid and staccato, harsh in his chest and growing harsher. He automatically pulled back and she instinctively grabbed at his wrist which only caused him to panic further, his strength greater than hers, pulling until she fell forward on the soft floor and he released himself, scrabbling away from her, something keening in his throat now as he tried to catch his breath, something that sounded like weeping. He knelt on all fours, his head low and tried to loosen the scarf around his neck a little, urgency in his movements, tipping back onto his heels and finally wrenching it with both hands so that his neck lay bare. Then with eyes shut he leaned forward again, one palm flat over the centre of his chest, fingertips digging into the material of his jumper, clawing at himself, choking, desperate, panic stricken.

Clara was on her feet almost as fast as he had been and closing the gap between them. Her instinct was to hold him but hadn't he just spun away from her when she had held his hand. What was this? What was happening?

'Doctor… Doctor… look at me… Doctor listen to me… you have to slow it down… slow your breathing… slowly….'

With her best calm teacher's voice she tried to bring him down and to its credit the TARDIS assisted by providing a soft breeze through the room which blew across his face and cooled the dampness on his skin. After a few minutes he slumped forward, then curled himself against the curved wall of the Zero Room and turned his head to one side. He breathed deeply but with none of the pressure or speed of before.

'Sorry…' he whispered.

'It's OK,' Clara replied unconvincingly, 'But I really think you need to tell me what this is about.'


	2. Chapter 2

The Doctor opened his eyes and looked across at her, the picture of shame but Clara wasn't moving on this one and he sensed he was beaten. Dragging himself into a more upright position he untucked his hands from where they had been hiding under the edges of his jacket and looked at his gloves. Clara followed his eyeline and prodded him into action.

'You can start with them,' she said, 'Why the gloves? If you had a white pair you'd complete the magician look nicely but right now you look like a stereotypical villain… black leather, really? It's a bit creepy…'

He managed a small laugh. 'Not very me?'

'Not for everyday wear,' she smiled. 'Well?' She gave him her best 'look' and he sighed.

'They muffle the noise,' he said at last.

She frowned.

'Excuse me, ear muffs muffle noise, gloves keep your hands warm.'

'Not when you're a telepath,' he said. 'A touch telepath anyway… at least that's how it's supposed to work. Touch something, hear something. Touch bare skin, hear more clearly…' he trailed off before taking a deep breath. Worry crossed his features. 'It's all gone a bit wrong, Clara… the telepathy... and I'm not sure why.'

'I'm not sure I'm following.'

He shifted against the wall. 'I first noticed after I'd regenerated. It was all louder than it had been before, it varies you see depending on which version of me I am. I just thought I had to retrain my mind again, like they taught us in the Academy. Get it under control, build the barriers between my mind and others, protect myself and only use it when needed. It took a while… and touch was… difficult…'

He watched her to see her response and was a mixed one. Finally he was talking but here was evidence that perhaps she had dared to hope too much for a change in him. 'Not a hugging person…' she said resignedly and nodded to herself. 'Ok.' She picked at her nails to avoid his gaze.

'As I said, _at first _it was difficult, I would see more than I wanted to, people's true thoughts and feelings… it was more than I could cope with to be honest.' There was something in his voice she couldn't put a name to, an implication to his words she couldn't term. But then he was explaining again and she moved past the doubt she felt.

'But eventually I got a bit of a handle on it,' he was saying, 'I could screen out the background noise, stop myself from hearing accidently. I managed for a while quite well...' she lifted her eyes to him and found a small kind smile on his lips. 'I became… a bit more of a hugging person… with a select few anyway,' he said meaningfully. Clara was surprised to find herself breathing a sigh of relief.

'So what's happened?' she asked.

'I don't know. These last few weeks everything is louder. I can't control it anymore. I can't be selective. I was never very good at it in the first place, I'd more or less stopped using it entirely just built a wall and turned it off… but recently… I mean very recently it's become….' He stopped searching for a word. Clara waited.

'It's become… ' he tried again, frustrated with himself. 'It's constant,' he said finally, 'Constant and loud. I can't be around people, crowds, it's a cacophony all the time and if they bump against me, even brush against me lightly it's deafening. This room is the only place I can get a bit of peace and even then...'

'Even then what?'

He looked sheepish. 'I can hear you… even on the other side of the ship.'

Clara felt a jolt of panic. 'Hear me doing what?'

'Being,' he said.

'Being? What do you mean being? And how can you hear if you don't touch?'

He looked down awkwardly. 'It's…' he started. 'We…'

'Well?'

His turn to avoid her eyes, the seams of his gloves becoming suddenly fascinating.

'Back on Gallifrey telepathy is the norm. In your mind you have a sense of it always. A sense of the people around you, their activities, their feelings. Yes, you use touch to hone in on specifics but there's another layer to it. Imagine…' he searched for a comparison, 'Imagine you have a child, a human might have what you call a mother's instinct about its welfare… well for us we sense its 'being,' its state of mind, if it's comfortable, hungry, cold or frightened, and it never leaves us. Even when I left Gallifrey I could sense them, my children, grandchildren, they were all linked to me. I could barely remember their faces and of course faces change with us anyway… but I could always feel them.' His sadness cloaked him for a moment and he stopped, his voice a tone away from breaking. 'It's like that with the people you… care for…' he said cautiously choosing his words, ' the people closest to you, you feel them… always.'

He dropped his gaze further and his tone changed, soft, distant.

'I felt my family until Gallifrey fell. Then there was nothing. Silence. I searched, I spent hours in this room seeking some sign of them, some faint emotion, something, but there was nothing. It seems I can't feel what lies in another dimension and I didn't think there would ever be anything in that space again, just this…. Void. A void inside me...'

There was a pause as Clara watched him, not knowing quite what to say, not knowing what it could possibly feel like to carry everyone you loved with you every moment only to have them torn away, no trace left. She was so used to a Doctor who was on the go, his mind bright and active, curious and intelligent, like a dazzling distracting sign. She easily forgot everything that had gone before, the hundreds of years of loneliness, the fact he was for all intents and purposes the last of his kind, it was only now and then she caught that look in his eyes, a glimmer of a darkness he carried deep inside, the utter burden his own being could be.

He seemed to feel her disquiet and roused himself from his thoughts. 'It's been a long time,' he said, 'The void became as much a part of me as they were, I almost got used to it and now…'

'And now there's all this noise?' Clara said trying to imagine what the contrast must feel like. The silence and the cacophony of untampered alien voices, no longer a sense of his family but an unfiltered racket of 'otherness.' But he surprised her with his answer.

'And now there's you,' he said.

Clara stared at him before he quickly explained, 'And everything else outside of this ship too if I brave it. But right now there's you because… you're the closest thing I have to family…' the admission made him look away from her and she felt awful for him. She wanted to reach out and wrap her arms around him, reassure him that she felt the same, give him permission to need someone, but instead she sat frozen, warded off by his awkwardness and the uniquely alien difficulty telepathy presented them. 'I don't know how to… I don't know what…' he stuttered, 'You're there all the time, sitting just outside my mind while I try and keep up the walls, and leave you be and and spare your blushes.'

'Spare my blushes? You probably wouldn't find anything too terrible,' Clara said in reassurance.

'There are some things I don't need to know,' he said cryptically. 'I try not to listen. It's your head, your private thoughts it would be wrong of me to intrude however accidently, however much you gave me permission. But I can sense you, all the time, your moods, your consciousness. And now… recently if I touch you…'

'Yes?'

'Then I can hear everything.'

'Everything?'

He glanced away and she saw his cheeks flush a little. Suddenly Clara gained a concept of how completely he must be able to read her, of just how much went on in her head all the time, the layers of thought, the active dialogue and the tiny fleeting glimpses, the involuntary things that crossed her mind, the dreams.

'You mean _everything_?' she repeated somewhat horrified. Everything might not have been a problem a few months ago but it certainly was now. Some of her thoughts had surprised even her. Particularly her thoughts about him. She swallowed.

'I try not to…' he said apologetically.

'It's fine…' Clara said awkwardly, 'Well I mean I suppose we're in each other's timelines, we share a lot anyway and what's a few thoughts between friends...' she said lightly, internally tumultuous. He glanced up at her sympathetically.

'Nice try,' he said and it was her turn to blush. 'But it's wrong to listen sometimes. I've been burned there before and learned my lesson.'

'With me?'

A cloud passing over his face. 'It took you a long time to accept me for who I was this time around Clara. Unfortunately your doubts surfaced at around the same time I was trying to relearn the skills to block out your thoughts.'

Clara's heart sank and guilt flooded her. Her recent thoughts about him were embarrassing but they were nowhere near as damaging as those she had had when he had first changed. He had heard her at his most vulnerable time, when she had struggled with who he was, doubted him, disliked him at times, longed for the old him to somehow return. Just how rejected must he have felt?

'Very,' he said, making her jump and her heart stab, 'But that's in the past. It wasn't easy for either of us. I didn't lack the ability to understand it, Clara, it just hurt to hear it… to feel your confusion, your grief at losing the other me, to be inadequate in your eyes. To feel all that and fail to be what you wanted, who you needed and yet still be intrinsically the same man, with the same feelings… It was hard. But I did understand.'

Clara felt her eyes burn and tried to avoid his gaze, but she knew already that he felt it too. It was coming off her in waves.

'You haven't done anything wrong,' he said, 'And that's what you need to remember here too… No matter how close we are some thoughts you wouldn't want anyone to hear, I understand that, private memories, desires even fears. I don't _want_ to hear them. They are yours to have alone, to process and work through, or to cherish. I don't want you to be uncomfortable. That's why…' he lifted one gloved hand and wriggled his fingers. 'I haven't seen much recently I promise,' he went on in an attempt to reassure her, 'When I felt it happening I took extra precautions.'

'The gloves and… The scarf?'

'You have a habit of flinging your arms round my neck.'

'Oh.'

'So you were avoiding me?'

'A bit,' he admitted.

'Idiot. That's not the solution.'

They sat in silence for a moment.

'What do you want to do?' Clara asked.

'What?'

'Well you can't live in here for the next two thousand years avoiding everyone.'

'No,' he said sadly.

'And I don't know about you but I was getting used to… you know just little things… like being able to hug you or hold your hand or…when we were reading in the library and… I'd like us to be able to do that again,' she finished. She felt embarrassed but after the revelation that he had heard her rejection of him she needed him to know that those things were precious, that he was precious.

In her mind's eye she saw herself cuddled up next to him, his fingers trailing over her shoulder as he read, twisting in her hair now and then. It had felt safe and easy. She wondered if he could feel her thoughts at that moment and she dared to check his expression. The look in his eyes nearly made her heart melt.

'Me too,' he said softly. He held her gaze a little too long. 'I mean… as companions.'

'So why is it happening and how do we fix it?' she said quickly.

'I have my theories,'

'Oh?'

He dismissed her rapidly, 'It doesn't much matter. As for how to fix it, I have no idea. If I was on Gallifrey I could consult the Academy but… well you know.' He shrugged and played with the tips of his gloved fingers. He suddenly looked very tired, deflated. There was a darkness under his eyes that the dim light had masked until now and a tightness to his expression that reminded her of his first days in his new body. Discomfort in his own skin. Her smiling Christmas hero was buried deep within it fighting a constant war against other people's thoughts and feelings, and most of all, hers.

She looked at the layers of clothing and replayed the last few times she had touched him. His expression, his desperate attempt to control what he was reading from her, the way he had trembled as she had sought his hands until finally he couldn't hold the walls up any longer and she must have flooded into his mind, a deafening painful tide. She had overwhelmed him. If he could go more slowly…

'I have an idea,' she said and he glanced up. 'But you'll need to take off at least one of those gloves…'

'Clara if I touch you I'll see… everything remember… we may even form a link we don't intend and you'll end up being sucked into my consciousness… now that's a place I wouldn't wish on anyone.'

But Clara wasn't having that. She had an idea and she had to try something. She couldn't leave him like this.

'Trust me, I think this will work, we're going to take it really slowly and you're going to build your walls up again just like you did before, brick by tiny brick and then when you're feeling more in control you can tackle why it's gone a bit haywire, you'll need to be able to focus for that.'

_That and you don't want to tell me your theory yet._

He looked at her quickly and she rushed her next words to distract him. 'Trust me… my head isn't that interesting, you'll be so bored after a while you'll want to close it all off. Now come on… glove!' she gestured and he smiled uncertainly.

'What are you going to do?' he pulled at the first fingers of his gloved right hand and the garment began to loosen.

'It's called desensitisation, or graded exposure.'

He cocked his eyebrow at her.

'I'm more than just a pretty face you know,' she said.

'Clara that's a very basic bit of human psychology, I don't think…'

'You think your big Time Lord brain is too advanced for it? Well it's the best we have right now so we're giving to give it a shot. Come here,' she gestured for him to come forward and sat in front of him cross legged, waiting for him to mirror her. When he finally relented and did so she gave her next instruction.

'Gloveless hand on your knee, now close your eyes.'

'Clara…'

'Close them.'

She watched as he dipped his head slightly and did as he was told, a stillness falling over him just as it had been when she had first seen him in the Zero Room meditating. He was centring himself, preparing for whatever she did next. Clara looked down at the hand which rested flat over the curve of his knee, at the long slim fingers and the pattern of his veins. They were the hands of an artist, elegant and fine, capable of great subtlety and magnificent gesture both. She reached forward and stroked both of her thumbs across the cool dorsal surface, a soft steady movement trailing down towards his fingers, along the length of his pinky and forefinger and then off, away from his body. She had heard him take a breath as she made contact with his skin, felt him tense, felt the tremor in him and now it passed over.

Clara repeated the movement, another slow sweep of his hand, this time curving her fingertips under so that they touched his palm. He tensed again but held his breathing steady, the tremor less this time. She kept going, watching his face, the tension moving over it in increased and reducing waves as she experimented, his brow furrowing at times as he held onto the walls in his mind and now and then his lips parting and a puff of air escaping him when the sensation was too much. Gradually she increased the pressure and the number of finger tips she was employing, until she was massaging in small circles from his wrist down. She stopped and reached for his other hand and he opened his eyes.

'Glove,' she said and he obediently removed it, settling his palm against his other knee. He shut his eyes again and she started the same process with his left hand until the tremor in his body was barely noticeable and she was able to cautiously knit her fingers with his so that both their hands were linked for a few seconds before she caught the rise in his breathing and gently pulled back.

'How's it going in there?' she asked.

'Getting there.'

'Have I been thinking anything shocking?'

'If you have I've managed not to hear it so far,'

Clara smiled.

'Need a break?' she asked.

He nodded, his eyes still shut, and she noticed the tiny beads of sweat at his temples. 'It's surprisingly hard work,' he said with embarrassment.

'It's ok, just let me know when you're ready… I've all the time in the world.'

Behind her the TARDIS unlocked the door but neither of them moved from their positions. The minutes ticked by.

'What comes next?' he asked some time later. The sweat had dried and the lines on his forehead were less pinched.

'I think you'll have to lose some of these layers,' Clara said. He raised his eyebrows.

'What exactly have you got in mind?' he asked with a faint air of panic.

'Nothing, silly, I just mean you have about four layers on, if I try to touch your arm, even…. You can't wear all these layers forever, just…' she gestured, 'Off with the jacket at least, and lose the scarf.'

He hesitantly brought one hand to the loops of the scarf and glanced at her. The look on his face made her giggle.

'Come on,' she said. 'You'd think I'd just asked you to do a strip tease. See how slowly we went with the gloves, that's how slowly this will go too. I'm going to touch your arms, maybe your shoulders… that's it I promise…'

He looked doubtfully down at his sleeves and then as though suddenly coming to some conclusion stripped off the jacket and folded it beside him. The scarf came next, half undone already after his earlier panic attack. His familiar moth eaten jumper lay beneath. Clara smiled approvingly.

'That's a much more normal level of dress for indoors. Good start.'

He shot her a semi serious look of irritation before his lip quirked.

'Ready to go again?' Clara asked.

'Ready,' he shut his eyes.

She started back at his hands and slowly wound her fingers around his wrists, her thumbs rubbing circles at the joints. Experimentally she slipped her fingertips under the long cuffs of his jumper and traced the fine hair of his forearms before pulling back at the sound of a low moan from his throat.

'You ok?'

'Just a bit…' he gathered himself, 'wall slipped a bit,' he explained, a faint blush to his cheeks. Clara shifted her hands to lay on top of his jumper.

'Better?'

He nodded and she continued her slow massage upwards towards his elbows. The peacefulness of the Zero Room was starting to affect her. The dim warm light and the pleasant scent, the rhythmic motions of her hands on his body. Clara found her own eyes closing and forced them open again to focus on his face, on his reactions. He still looked reasonably peaceful so she shifted forward a little on the soft cream floor until her knees were touching his and she could reach his upper arms more easily. He breathed in heavily and held it.

Clara froze, her hands on his biceps, 'Want me to stop?' she asked.

He indicated no with a slight shake of his head and she could feel the effort running through him, the muscles twitching under her fingers. She watched his face, saw the breath come back to him with a long shallow exhalation through his lips.

His lips. Her eyes lingered there a moment and she felt a warm buzz at her chest travel to her stomach. At the same time her thumbs pushed against his muscles and rubbed his skin through the sleeves of his jumper.

The Doctor's eyes flew open and Clara jumped.

'What?' she said. He stared at her owlishly for a moment before he shook his head.

'Nothing… nothing I just… I'm sorry… I didn't mean to…'

Clara's eyes widened.

'Did you hear something?'

'Only faintly,' he said, his voice doubtful, 'I mean… not details… just…' he looked away just as she blushed, 'just a sense.' Clara swallowed.

'Ok,' she managed, 'Well we just keep working on that particular bit of the wall,' she slipped her hands lower down his arms and loosened her grip, 'And I'll er.. I'll try and keep my head a bit emptier meantime…'

He looked at her sideways, 'Right.'

'Right.'

They resumed positions and he closed his eyes. Clara slowly worked her way back up his arms until her palms rested on his shoulders and they had to unfold their legs a little and rearrange their limbs to allow her close enough to almost hold him. The Doctor continued to take each step as it came, adjusting his breathing, his body. Whatever he was doing, building, training his mind to block her thoughts and feelings, it seemed to be working. Gradually the process sped up and seemed to be coming easier to him.

His face relaxed and Clara watched the tension slip from his brow. He was serene and finally stress free and it lent him an odd kind of beauty in her eyes. She was close enough to inhale him, a scent like forests and TARDIS laundry powder. It made her smile, her strangely alien yet somehow human Doctor, sitting there under her touch, practicing his anti-telepathy. It was just one of the many odd things she had done over the last year or two and she briefly wondered if she could get employment as some sort of Time Lord Therapist should they ever find Gallifrey.

The Doctor burst out laughing suddenly.

'What?'

'Clara your ego is running away with you,' he said, 'Time Lord Therapist indeed…'

'Hey I'm doing Ok here aren't I… apart from... apparently right now… where you seem to be reading my mind again,' she said despairingly and dropped her hands from his shoulders.

'I could hardly not, that was quite the vivid image you projected. I liked the white coat, do therapists wear white coats these days?'

'No… I just…'

He chuckled.

'Shut up!' she said. 'Focus!'

'Sorry… focusing,' he closed his eyes again. 'Stop thinking about slapping me.'

'Shut up!' she laughed.

'Blocking you out now,' he replied smugly.

Clara put her hands back on his shoulders. 'You'd better be.'

'Why are you thinking something scandalous?' he asked.

Clara moved her hands to his neck playfully. Sometimes she could strangle him.

'Hey!'

'Behave!'

He swallowed a laugh and Clara forced herself to do the same.

'This is serious stuff you know,' she said resting her hands at the sides of his neck. The tips of her fingers found their way into his hair and scratched there absently. 'We've got to get you all functional again it's been boring without you…'

'Has it?' he asked. She watched as he very gently leaned against her touch.

'Yes, adventures are officially rubbish without you.'

'I'll remind you of that next time you're moaning at me about the poor facilities on various planets,' his words were still playful but the tone of his voice was layered with a rare sort of gentleness.

'I'm not staying anywhere without running water again,' she said pushing her hands further into his hair, letting it twist in her fingers, soft and thick. She thought she heard a little sigh escape him.

'Oi! Concentrate,' she warned.

'I am.'

'Blocking thoughts remember,'

'I _am_.'

'Hmm,'

Her thumbs crept up to his temples and massaged there gently.

'Hmm,' he agreed distractedly. She shifted yet closer and Clara found herself kneeling between his thighs, her face near to his and their breath mingling. More and more her gaze was drawn to his parted lips, to the soft skin of his face, to the tiny details she had never seen or noticed before. Her thumbs traced his cheekbones and below until they dragged gently over his lower lip and this time the sigh was audible enough, a warm needy noise that made her want to press herself close to him. Without thinking she leant her forehead against his and closed her eyes.

He drew in a sharp breath, his hands leaving his knees and clasping her hips. 'Clara!'

Something flashed in her mind, a sudden giving way of something carefully constructed, images pouring into her consciousness, memories and faces, voices and objects and landscapes from a thousand different planets and a thousand more years. Emotions flooding over her, making her heart leap and spin and sink in equal measure. The greatest joy and the most profound loss melding together, tearing her apart and then suddenly layers of time, brightly lit spheres, peeling away, rushing towards the centre of something, towards the centre of him, one voice, one face, one being trapped in darkness.

It was her.

Clara.

_My Clara._


	3. Chapter 3

Clara reeled backwards and landed on the floor of the Zero Room, panting for breath. A few feet away the Doctor half sprawled, one hand held to his forehead, slowly recovering. She sat up hesitantly, fighting back a wave of nausea and a sharp pain at the base of her neck.

'What… was that?' she asked.

A pause. 'We linked consciousness…' he said quietly.

'How?'

'We… I….' he took a steadying breath, 'It's my fault, I'm sorry, you took me a bit by surprise, I relaxed too much, opened channels I wasn't aware of… I shouldn't have let you touch me…' he gestured to his neck, 'I thought I had it under control but when our foreheads touched… I shouldn't have let you do that.'

'But everything was fine, you were blocking it all out, you were back in control.'

'I'm not up to full strength yet and that was…well that particular move you did…'

'What move? The forehead thing?'

He blushed and looked away, 'It's… well it's a bit intimate, generally only done with… I mean when two people…'

'Oh,' Clara said quickly, 'Oh. Right.'

Silence.

'Sorry,' he said awkwardly.

'But I've seen you do it before, to read people… and you weren't… you know…'

'Not like that,' he said, 'We… you and I were …' he waved one of his hands… 'Entwined. We'd been… touching for a while.' His cheeks burned.

'Didn't you think you should warn me this could happen?'

'I didn't think it would, I didn't think you'd…'

'What?'

'Want it to,' he said almost inaudibly, 'It has to be mutually consensual to work.'

'Oh,' another pause.

'So you thought you'd just risk it?' she said. 'You knew it could get all heavy and 'Vulcan Mind Meld' but you thought you'd have a look into my head anyway and just hope I didn't decide to join in. I trusted you!'

'I…'

Clara stared at him. She wasn't sure if she was really angry or not, she just had the overwhelming sense that he wasn't telling her something, that there was a motive here undiscussed. That once again she was being kept out in the cold.

'I was... enjoying it,' he confessed causing her to halt her internal debate. 'It felt…'

'It felt what?'

And suddenly he was hiding his face from her, eyes suddenly wet with a strength of emotion she rarely if ever saw in him and it frightened her. Whatever was going on was about to disintegrate in front of her and him with it.

'Oh Gods Clara, I'm sorry,' he said, his voice cracking, 'I didn't mean to…'

'Didn't mean what?'

'I was blocking you I promise and then… then it got more difficult and I lost control of it but I didn't stop… I could feel you there and that emptiness was gone for a while and….'

Clara couldn't believe what she was hearing.

'You weren't blocking me?'

'Not near the end no… I just wanted to feel it for a minute, I've missed it, I've been so lonely Clara…'

'Feel what, what are you talking about?'

A tear spilled from his eye and he swiped it away, his irritation with himself and his shame evident.

'Feel what?' she repeated.

'Your love,' he said softly, lifting his eyes to her for just a second, 'I just wanted to let you fill the void.'

Slowly Clara crawled across the soft floor to where he knelt and came to a halt in front of him. He refused to look at her but hunched himself into much the position he had been in when she first entered the Zero Room. She watched as more tears slipped slowly over his cheeks and felt a lump form in her own throat. If ever there was a picture of what loneliness could do it was this.

'What was your theory?' she asked after a moment.

'What?' he wiped his eyes and looked distractedly around him.

'Your theory, why your telepathy had gone wrong? You have one right, you just didn't want to say.'

He looked away briefly, his gaze landed on one of his gloves before he picked it up and began hunting for the other.

'Oh… that…' he said.

'Well?'

He didn't want to say. Clara spotted the second stray glove and snatched it before he could reach it. He gave up and sat back. 'It's just… Everything sounds so loud because…'

'Because…'

'Because I'm going against every instinct I have,' he said tiredly, the words rushing, 'I've been blocking things out for so long and my mind won't let me do it any more. It's not normal for a Time Lord's mind to be empty of others, for that void to go unfilled and since… since Christmas it… my mind …has seen an opportunity in you to be whole again.'

'So…?' but she already knew what was coming.

'So its seeking to fill itself, its fighting against me, listening harder and harder trying to hear through the walls I build. It's exhausting, and I can't do it anymore and now the walls have collapsed and all I can hear is this deafening roar. Everything magnified, everything so loud, so that I might be forced to listen to the one thing it thinks I should hear. I'm sorry, I never meant this to happen Clara, all I can hear is you… but I can't… I shouldn't…'

She took his hand in one firm gesture and held him fast.

'You shouldn't what?'

'I shouldn't use you to fill the void.'

She looked at him steadily, at the conflict in his features and at the doubt that a millennium of loneliness had grown in him. She smiled gently and reached forward letting her fingertips trace his jaw, his lips. She felt a soft rush of something at the edge of her mind.

It felt like hope.

'You're not using me, you're loving me.' Blue eyes flickering over her face, uncertain, painful. 'Let me in,' she said.

She thought the moment would never end, the way he looked at her in terror, the way he seemed to fight with himself even as she pulled herself forward again and pushed her fingers into his hair, her free hand tangling in his jumper and tugging him closer to meet her. She could feel his hearts beginning to race and his breathing pick up and for a second she feared he would panic as he had before, but then she had him in her arms and that moment passed and she was bringing his forehead to meet hers again.

This time she held on even as his memories poured over her with all the intensity of a living dream. Even as every night of loneliness on Trenzalore showed itself to her with each tear he had shed at their separation. Here was a thousand years of waiting for the end and fearing it would be alone. Here were the faces of her echoes falling one by one to time and leaving him. And here was the void, the gaping chasm where love once sat, deep in the darkest part of him, unfilled for centuries, now and then touched briefly by a friend or companion only to lie empty again, a tomb to the emotions of a life long gone, a life that had included a wife and children and all the trappings of love.

The pain was incredible. The noise deafening just as he had described it. A howling wind of agony, swirling around her body.

_Listen Listen Listen._

His mind battering against the remnants of a broken wall of self-defence, trying to reach her in the darkness, but the darkness was thick and full.

The Void had become a living breathing thing, filling the place made for love, ending anything that tried to defy it.

Clara stood in the centre of the void and felt it surround her, felt its fingers reach for her skin with the coldest of touches, felt its eyes on her, judgemental and superior, mocking her intentions, mocking her primitive human heart and its ability to drive the blackness away. It angered her, it made her burn. She _would _drive it away, if this was what he felt every day, if this frozen pain sat at the centre of him each hour then she had no choice but to banish it. She felt his mind reach out to her, the whispering part of him that had been trying to reach her through his own self-imposed barriers, the part of him that despite himself, knew better. It had been trying to get him to listen and now finally he had.

Clara held out her hand and she felt him take it at last.

He was kissing her. As the dark began to fall away he was kissing her and light tore down blackened drapes like burning meteorites streaking through sky. Suddenly there was so much light and heat and power and Clara fell back against the soft floor of the Zero Room, into the softness of his arms, his mind, as his lips claimed hers desperately, his body above hers and between her legs, his mouth on her neck, in the V of her blouse, on the pale flesh of her belly as he tore open her top.

Half in and half out of reality, she reached for the dark layers of clothing that covered him, pulled his jumper over his head, stripped away the black shirt below, his skin pale and glowing in the warm light of the room, her hands working fast on his belt, his zipper. She had to free him of the pain, of the darkness, she had to let the light reach his skin. She had to let him fill her and so fill that lonely void.

He pulled away the last of her clothes and she felt the soft floor thicken beneath them, her body cushioned as he climbed atop her again, his lips searing hers, his tongue deep and needy in her mouth. She saw the light of their joined consciousness blaze hard for a second before another torrent of images cascaded from him and drew away her breath. Images of her naked, prone on a bed, wrapped around his body, straddling his hips, kneeling before him, taking him in her mouth.

Images of him plunging deep into her, sensations of tightness and warmth, the slippery feel of her core, the ache in his length as took her, the building pressure in his abdomen, his hand moving between her folds, over himself as fantasy became memory and joined reality in a tidal wave of desire. How he had pictured each scenario, the bittersweet pleasure he had given himself at her image, hundreds of years of longing and wishing now streaming into her.

And amongst them images of her face, her eyes, the sound of her laughter, the tones of her voice, the simplest gestures made beautiful by dint of being hers alone. How often he had wished he could touch her hair or inhale the scent of her skin again. How long he waited to see her only to have him regenerate and her reject him. As he slid into her Clara felt a stab of pain at her heart which came from his memory and pulled him tighter into her arms. A thousand years without her and he was given new life only to hear her doubts, only for her to fail to recognise the Doctor, her Doctor. His Clara, no longer his. She felt the void smile inside him, she was failing him already. No one had ever wanted her more, no one had ever loved her more and she hadn't even seen it.

She kissed him fiercely and willed the darkness away from him, her hands at once holding him tightly and raking down his back. She ground up hard with her hips and forced him to drive deep into her, so deep it hurt but she couldn't get enough. He hooked his arms under her knees and pulled her closer until he was pounding hard into her core and he was leaning down into her, his teeth clamping on her neck and his fingernails digging into her skin. Clara could feel the heat building inside her, feel the desperate need to move faster, harder, to feel more, be it pressure, depth or pain. She needed him, she needed him inside her so deep that he became a part of her and she would never let go. The images in her mind became more focused, centring on where their body joined, their combined mind's eye watching as he slammed into her roughly, listening as the breath came from her throat in a tight gasp. He was losing control and rapidly, the images ever more explicit, the things he wanted from her more basic, a commentary in his mind describing his needs. He wanted to take her, fuck her, own her, make her his. She was about to become part of him forever.

The noise coming from him was deep and guttural, a low and increasing moan from her shoulder as his body began to pitch its rhythm and drive itself to its conclusion. The crescendo was building in agonising slowness despite his increasingly frenzied movements but Clara could feel her own release coming quickly, circling her hips desperately against him as he growled urgently into her neck. She was almost there, suspended on the edge when she felt the darkness surge back at them, the mocking blackness of the void teasing them both, his self-doubt filling it and pushing her back with cold tendrils. She felt his movements start to slow, a sudden hitch in his breath that spoke more of pain than passion, he dipped his head to lean against her shoulder.

'I…. I can't… I can't…'

Clara grabbed his face in her hands and forced him to look at her, driving up with her hips as she did so, clamping her muscles around him, seizing his mouth in a deep kiss before looking deep into his wide pupils. The sadness was creeping in, the loathing for himself he tried to bury edging its way back relentlessly.

'Don't stop,' she said, 'Don't stop, don't listen to it, listen to the part of you that wants to let me in and do it.'

He couldn't look at her, couldn't bring himself to continue, his hips slowed, his eyes drifted shut. Clara felt his hearts ache as she held him, felt the triumph of the blackness in the void. Heard it whisper.

_Always alone. Always._

She was still holding his face and began kissing it gently, tiny butterfly kisses to his cheeks, his nose, his forehead. She rubbed his cheekbones with her thumbs pulled him down closer, peppered his lips with more caresses, focused on the void and the darkness that was trying to block out the light they had created together.

_Listen listen listen._

The mind behind the wall desperately try to reach her, but the wall was reforming. A product of his insecurity, building itself again at the request of the void. Clara looked up at the fading light and the last shreds of blackness closing over the gap it fell through. The wall was at her shoulders now, his mind becoming faint and she could feel tears under her thumbs.

'I love you,' she whispered, 'I love you, I love you…' and she kissed him again, 'I'm going to keep loving you and keep saying it until you believe me, until you break down that bloody wall and join me. I'm not leaving, you can't get rid of me that easily, don't think you can push me out with your darkness. Listen… listen… I love you…'

The light above faded to a slim crack, the void growing colder, darker, the feel of a thousand frozen hands reaching for her.

'Don't give up…' she whispered, tears close. 'I'm right here… all you have to do is…'

The light exploded overhead and Clara felt him surge forward into her again, his eyes opening, holding her in his gaze, the blue irises rimmed with something golden she had never seen there before. It took her breath away and for a moment she lost track of reality and consciousness, floated between the two worlds, there was only him.

'Clara,' he breathed, and then he was kissing her again with that frantic desperate passion he had shown before except this time his fear was gone. The light shone brightly and totally, no threads of darkness lingered and they drove onwards together quickly, his hand holding her hips to him as he climbed the last peak of excitement, her body beginning to buck under him in release before he reached the first hints of orgasm and then suddenly it was spilling from him, surge after surge, the blinding searing golden light pouring over her spirit as his seed emptied into her body, and his cry sharp at first then prolonged, exquisite, drawing from him in waves, the pleasure profound and mind altering.

Clara felt the weight of him settle over her as he recovered, slipping down her body to rest his cheek on her chest, one hand tracing the curve of her waist gently. The void was gone. Replaced instead with a chamber not unlike the Zero Room itself, soft and welcoming, golden and warm. This, Clara understood, was where love belonged. She closed her eyes and retreated to it and found him there, a somehow more whole and complete Doctor than she had known before, and she realised that this was where the essence of him lay, where he was not one of his faces but all of them, but where he was still undeniably hers alone.

She paused and looked around the chamber, its transformation from darkness so complete, so entire, that she knew in herself that the void would never return, that this place would always be her home. That even when time passed and he changed and she no longer lived there would be this sanctuary. That he had remembered how to love and that he would never be afraid to.

That he would never be alone again.


End file.
